Fresno hospital's policy keeps gay couple apart

GAY RIGHTS

Civil rights groups urged a Fresno hospital to change its policies on Monday after employees briefly barred a lesbian from visiting her girlfriend, who went into a seizure at a gay marriage march.

Kristin Orbin, 29, collapsed May 30 after walking 14 miles in the "Meet in the Middle 4 Equality" protest, held days after California's highest court upheld a ban on same-sex unions.

As she fell in and out of consciousness, Orbin was rushed to Community Regional Medical Center, where she says an ambulance driver kept her girlfriend of four years, Teresa Rowe, from seeing her in the emergency room. Rowe, 30, says hospital employees also ignored her pleas to visit Orbin for more than two hours as well as her requests to talk to a doctor about Orbin's treatment.

"I kept asking for Teresa, and they told me I was in a no-visitor zone," said Orbin, a student who lives in Suisun City. "All kinds of other people had visitors, so I told the attendant that didn't make any sense. She said, 'Well, those people are different.' "

Michelle Van Valkenburg, a spokeswoman for Community Medical Centers, the nonprofit system that runs the Fresno facility, said in a statement Monday that an internal investigation found Orbin had received good care and the hospital followed proper procedures.

The couple are not legal domestic partners, but Rowe has the legal authority to make medical decisions for Orbin, as well as power of attorney.

Attorneys claim the hospital discriminated against the couple based on their sexual orientation, failed to follow anti-discrimination portions of the patient's bill of rights and broke state law by ignoring Rowe's requests to avoid treating Orbin with Ativan, an anti-seizure drug.